Linus Tech Tips is predicting $699.99 ± 60.

I was frustrated that the most probable range is $500 - $1000 but that's only covered by two options. I created this market: https://manifold.markets/AndrewMaxwell/steam-machine-512gb-base-sku-price-2AQsI0Idys which gives more granular options in the most probable range.

Steam Machine 512gb base SKU price? (More granular options)

Resolves to whichever value is closest to Valve's first announced MSRP for the US, not including sales tax/tariffs/shipping cost/etc.

The big trick they could pull here is bundling HL3 (if they are going to release HL3) with it. Do a whole "buy the Steam Machine at $800, get HL3 for free a month before everyone else"

@Stralor I still think that would be a flop, but it's at least a mitigating factor

https://redd.it/1p1f0uv

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Steam-Machine-price-may-be-much-higher-than-PS5-after-Valve-reportedly-balks-at-500-suggestion.1166758.0.html

"The YouTuber suggested that a Steam Machine price of $500 would make it a legitimate console contender. ... 'Nobody said anything, but the energy in the room wasn’t great'."

@AndrewMaxwell oof. like the 500 price point is so obviously true to every outsider observer. really hope they don't shoot themselves in the foot

@Stralor I agree, I can't see this being successful for much more than $600 base price. The only exception is if increased component prices cause higher prices across the board, including PS5 and custom PCs.

On the other hand, maybe I'm spoiled by nearly always buying used parts...

Would $499.95 be truncated to 499, or rounded to 500?

@JimHays Good question. $499.99 would be "$400–$499".

I'm going to try to estimate the cheapest you could build one for retail.

Roughly a Ryzen 5 7500F and Radeon 7500 (which doesn't exist, but that's where this would fall), call it around $400 for the AMD parts. 16GB RAM and a half-TB SSD probably add another $70 or so? Power supply and chassis probably $50? The motherboard is hard to estimate, but based in the presence of USB2 (LOL) it's probably a low-end chipset, and at best two slots of RAM and only a single PCIe slot + single NVMe, so... Call it $50, including WiFi?

So that's $570, very roughly, to make a comparable machine from low-end parts purchased at sale prices. It doesn't include labor, either assembly or installing the OS. Valve can probably get better prices than even on-sale retail, but... I'm having a hard time seeing the case for a unit price below $500. On the other hand, over $750 seems less likely, especially since components are all at least one generation old and will probably be available cheaper than their original retail prices.

With, of course, one caveat: they could sell it at a loss. Lots of console vendors do.

@SeekingEternity The thing about this is, unlike the Deck or Frame, it doesn't really require super customized electronics like weird size mobos or other components to fit in an arbitrary case shape.

I think it could be sub 500.

• Fairly standard sizes

• No cutting edge parts with insane specs

• Instead, lots of easy to source at-a-discount components that are tried and true like the older USBs, wifi 6e, zen 4, etc

• SteamOS instead of Windows OEM license

• Specialist device mostly trying to compete with consoles, not your PC, but inevitably it competes with both

• Minimal flashiness vs what you'd expect out of a $1-2k "gaming pc"

Really it's gonna be compared most to the Deck, which is $400-650, is impressively powerful for its size (thanks SteamOS), and has the advantage of portability and a built-in screen -- they can't reasonably go higher than that price range even if it's technically more powerful. I've got to imagine they know that and aimed to make something super tantalizing in the 400-500 range, if they want it to move units at all and not give ground to like a 3rd party up-specced r pi running SteamOS.

The Frame? Sure, that could be 800-1000 because it's a hard space with lots of custom micro parts. I hope it'll be much lower so it disrupts the ecosystem and increases adoption, but it doesnt have to. The Machine kinda has to stay cheap.

@Stralor I mean, I don't disagree with any of what you say except to call the Deck's performance "impressive" on any metric other than "you paid money for that? On purpose?", but consoles emperically can move units at >$500 price points.

One place my estimate could be off is if they can get parts that are both wholesale & clearance, but given the "semi-custom" CPU and GPU, I doubt they can. Those aren't off-the-shelf components that can be pulled out of a warehouse somewhere, they're specially-built parts with the specs of low-end-for-gaming three-year-old parts. Valve presumably can promise a good minimum volume to try and wrangle a discount, and using older-gen parts means at least probably not competing for the scarce fab lines producing cutting-edge parts, but gaming hardware is expensive across the board right now and the margins on low-end parts are tight; wholesale doesn't save you that much.

You might notice I didn't include software license costs in the price estimate I gave above. Or QA. Or assembly (though I did mention it).

I agree it'll be a much more compelling product if they can sell it < $500, I just don't think they can without taking a loss per-unit. Which might be worthwhile to them, especially given the psychological benefit of $499 vs. e.g. $570 and is why I didn't bet it higher.

@SeekingEternity looking at what current RAM prices are doing this is probably an underestimate now, by at least $50 and maybe $100. So call it $620-$670 for bill of materials. Still probably falls below $750 at retail but they could decide they want margins more than volume, I guess.

The base model will be 256gb, not 512.

edit: oops I thought this was for the headset. Should have spent two seconds reading before commenting

@Lovix opened a market for the headset too ! https://manifold.markets/ary/256gb-steam-frame-launch-price-rang